Exciting 2025 Club World Cup news as Messi’s Inter Miami are doing something or other and Man City have been drawn with Wydad AC and Al Ain. In the group stage. Next summer. Read all about it or read Philippe Auclair’s piece on all this shenanigans.

The 100 best female footballers in the world 2024. Here’s the third instalment of our annual ranking. Temwa Chawinga, Ewa Pajor and Lauren James all feature as we move up to 11th.

Anyway, forget the top four, let’s take a moment to pay tribute to Fulham and Alex Iwobi.

• Fulham are sixth in the table after beating Brighton 3-1 last night.

• Alex Iwobi (4) has now scored twice as many goals as Erling Haaland (2) in the last six Premier League games.

A report here on how Iwobi’s double lifted the Cottagers into the top six.

So to this weekend’s Premier League fixtures. Fun fact: the top four all face away trips.

Saturday
12.30 Everton v Liverpool
15.00 Aston Villa v Southampton
15.00 Brentford v Newcastle
15.00 Crystal Palace v Man City
17.30 Man Utd v Nottingham Forest

Sunday
14.00 Fulham v Arsenal
14.00 Ipswich v Bournemouth
14.00 Leicester v Brighton
16.30 Spurs v Chelsea

Monday
20.00 West Ham v Wolves

The Premier League table is starting to take shape now with a very clear and obvious top four.

And to complete a good midweek for the chasing pack, even Manchester City managed to win. After fever dream form of LLLLLDL, Pep finally got a W thanks to a 3-0 home victory over Nottingham Forest. They’re now nine off the pace after a game that saw them double their season’s goal difference to +6.

Arsenal also pulled to within seven of Liverpool after scoring twice from corners in their 2-0 win over Manchester United on Wednesday night. That ended Ruben Amorim’s three-game unbeaten start as Old Trafford boss. The Portuguese had said prior to the Emirates clash: “The storm will come. We are going to have difficult moments and we will be found out in some games.” This was one of them.

Are Chelsea in the title race or not really? Their 5-1 win at Southampton says yes and while you read the report of that one and ponder if they have it in them to win the Premier League, enjoy a picture of the week contender: the lovely blue tones of Christopher Nkunku blowing up a balloon after he scored Chelsea’s second.

Liverpool’s lead at the top was cut to seven points after their thrilling 3-3 draw at Newcastle on Wednesday night. Conceding a 90th-minute equaliser is always going to hurt – just punch it Caoimhin! – but at least Arne Slot made some promising noises about Mo Salah signing a new contract after the Egyptian continued his ridiculously good form with two goals and an assist.

And now for Coleen, who has made quite a mark during her time on I’m A Celeb. She’s second favourite with the bookies by the way. Feature here:

Let’s take you into Rooney world and we’ll start with Wayne, who is coming to terms with recent 6-1 (Norwich) and 4-0 (Bristol City) losses which left Plymouth 21st place in the Championship. Their away form shows two points from a possible 30; the Pilgrims’ goal difference on the road is -24.

However, Plymouth owner Simon Hallet told a fans forum this week that “there are no conversations going on about replacing Wayne” and, to be fair, Rooney’s side have been pretty decent at Home Park with just one defeat in eight matches. A good time then for Plymouth to have back-to-back home matches. The first is against Oxford, who are also winless on the road.

Ange is sucking it up after Tottenham’s miserable defeat at Bournemouth. It ended 1-0 but could have easily been three of four. “You’ve got to cop it,” he growled later. Here’s the reaction as Spurs’ highly miffed fans let him know what they thought.

Preamble